While Bashing The Fed, Fox's Stossel Gets His History Wrong

On tonight's O'Reilly Factor, Fox Business host John Stossel explained the logic behind Congressman Ron Paul's call to "abolish the Fed" and cited as evidence the recession of 1920, which Stossel claimed ended in 1921 when there was "no Fed." There's just one problem -- the Federal Reserve was established in 1913.

From Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:

STOSSEL: The Fed printed money, helped create the housing bubble. The Fed has kept interest rates low. That fueled the housing bubble. And now they're trying to prop it up. It's not just the Fed. I disagree there. It's the Fed and the government. Fannie and Freddie saying, "We can't let housing prices drop." As Ron Paul said, you have to let the market clear so it can recover. And the conceit that the 12 people in the Fed can run a whole economy is terrible.

O'REILLY: OK, so he wants to execute or put them Guantanamo Bay? What does he want to do with them?

STOSSEL: He wants to go -- he wants to abolish the Fed.

O'REILLY: Get out of there.

STOSSEL: We had our big recession in 1920, no Fed. We recovered in 1921. You don't need them.